Gaza looms large over Arab Americans this year, saysJames Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute.
An ally of Jesse Jackson, he earned a speaking role at the 1988 Democratic convention.
He later served as a Bernie Sanders appointee on the Democratic National Conventions platform committee in 2016.
Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a rally at the Dort Financial Center on October 04, 2024 in Flint, Michigan.Scott Olson/Getty Images
The transcript that follows has been edited for length and clarity.
For readers who are not familiar, c’mon describe your history working on Palestinian rights.
I started the Palestine Human Rights Campaign in the 1970s.
It was a period of effervescence.
A lot of folks from the [Southern Christian Leadership Conference] joined our board.
I knewDon Luceand Dave Dellinger and Pete Seeger and got them all involved.
We had a big support base among the Arab community, because nobody had done anything around Palestine before.
In the last year, we saw something new.
A different demographic came to the forefront: young people.
I would look around and Id say: Where did these people come from?
They never embraced Palestine before.
It wasnt an Arab-led thing.
It was progressive Jews who were doing it, and the student encampments were everybody.
Wed never seen that kind of response on this before.
It empowered my community.
In the Democratic camp, this was the first time more Democrats favored Palestinians than favored Israel, Israelis.
That had never happened before either.
But thats a lot of people.
What is the view among Arab Americans?
Go down the line, theyd be no different than the rest of the country.
Now when we polled Arab Americans, we also found something we hadnt seen before.
Because now they no longer felt isolated.
And among Democrats, it was the top issue.
It crosses all the lines.
Its Lebanese, and Egyptians, and Palestinians.
Its also Muslims and Christians.
Its the recent immigrants and the ones born here.
When you get numbers that high, it impacts the vote in a significant way.
It was the first time we had actually Trump in the lead, 42 to 41.
What would those numbers typically look like for the Arab community?
Since [George W.] Bush, the second election, 2004, theyve been 2-to-1 Democrat.
So to have that split down the middle is a really remarkable shift.
The other part of it is that 80 percent of Republicans said they were enthusiastic about voting.
And only 63 percent of Democrats, which means they may not even turn out at all.
And that was before Lebanon happened.
There is, but the main population is Lebanese.
And then theres also Iraqi and Yemeni.
But it was never a center for Palestinians, for example, in the way Chicago became one.
Thank you for the correction.
Im curious how this is likely to impact the 2024 election.
Today, the majority population in Dearborn is Arab American.
The police police chief is Arab.
The state rep. is Arab.
The congresswoman is Rashida Tlaib.
Many of the constituents are Lebanese who have deep attachments to Palestinians.
Is the Arab voter shift to Trump reversible?
That Trump vote going to 42 percent was an increase of 7 percent.
But that 7 percent was soft.
Thats not a smart political move, but thats what people are feeling.
And I dont have an argument to make because they havent given us arguments to make.
Who is they, Im sorry?
They dont seem to care enough about the Arab American vote to do something to get it.
The people Jesse Jackson used to call the smart-ass white boys are back.
As opposed to the 80s, theyre not all white, and theyre not all boys.
But theyre the class who are smarter-than-God.
They have it all figured out.
Theyre going with Liz Cheney and appealing to traditional Republican values.
If thats where theyre going to pick up their votes, good luck.
Thats the point, right?
Theres the cult of Trump, and that cult of Trump is pretty much locked in place.
Attraction to Trump is often more a feeling of rejecting the system.
They keep thinking that the Obama coalition is what that theyll win with.
And the Democrats havent figured that out.
Democrats are supposed to be reality-based.
What hampers them seeing the threat you see?
Well, theres a political consultancy blob in politics, too.
And they never lose an election because they always make their money.
But they never get judged by the mistakes they make.
No one in the campaign can give us a reason why.
I know why because it tookimagination, and the political consultants have no imagination.
So they know whats too risky, and weve never done it before.
If you looked at that convention this year, there were groups that nobody even knew existed.
You know, left-handed steeplechasers.
Demographics that people were like,Why is that person speaking!
?But not a single Arab person spoke.
And theyre not paying attention.
Yet there seems to be no ability to separate the Netanyahu government from Israel writ large.
I dont get it.
They want him out, but whatever he does, theyll support.
And this administration has made judgments along the way that have been perfectly baffling.
The president went on television to announce a three-point peace plan.
Netanyahu, within an hour and a half, did a tweet saying,thats not the deal.
And basically repudiated what the president said.
What did the White House do?
Hamas theyre no angels.
Theyre also the bad guys in this equation.
But we lied to the Security Council.
We lied to the press.
But weve never been willing to accept applying consequences to Israeli behavior.
Vance in Springfield, Ohio.
But they are giving a pass to the dehumanization of people in Gaza and now southern Lebanon.
Six buildings that housed people got blown up.
We still dont have a body count.
Have you gotten outreach from the campaign this cycle?
They call me to go to a meeting.
Im like: Give me a reason why.
Id love to do it.
Im honored to get the invitation, but you have to give us a reason why.
I dont need a resume builder.
The future of our country is at stake.
I really want her to win.
But I need her to help me.
I havent got that much left.
But Ive got 50 years of work, building trust with my community.
I dont need a photo op, shaking hands with the candidate.
I need to feel confident, when I go to my community, that the message will be accepted.
Lets talk plainly about the alternative: the idea that Trump is somehow going to make things better.
Whats your view of Trump for the Arab American community?
It would be a nightmare.
The same thing that is now happening with other immigrants will just as likely happen to you.
I can make all the arguments against Trump and against the Republican Party.
I just need a reason to argue for voting for Harris before I go out and do it.
And Ive been doing it, but its a heavy lift.
Trump likes to talk about himself as if he were a pacifist or peace-maker on foreign policy.
Do you have any indication that his relationship vis a vis Netanyahu would be any different?
He loves Bibi because Bibi is winning, and he would continue to support him winning.
This is not a good guy, and his policy will not be any better.
We have just marked the Oct. 7 anniversary.
What are your reflections on the convulsive year that weve seen in the aftermath?
History didnt begin on Oct. 7, and it didnt end that day either.
Its as if only one people suffer.
The story on Oct. 7 will be: Jews suffered the worst tragedy since the Holocaust.
I can hear the wailing, and its deserved.
Everybody deserves the right to mourn their dead.
Or their pain and suffering matters.
Its presented like a conflict between the Israeli humanity and the Palestine problem.
And so how do we solve the problem so that humanity can live in peace?
Thats how we frame it.
Is Democratic leadership open to that discussion?
I remember going and seeing somebody at the White House early on, like two weeks into this.
And he went on about the trauma of the Jewish people and what happened and how it was unforgivable.
And I said, I agree with you.
The first time I ever got a headline in a newspaper wasTheWashington Postin the 70s.
And the headline was: Arab Speaker Chides Community About Antisemitism.
What I told him is that I grew up understanding this issue, and I do.
I understand the trauma and what it evokes in terms of fear of pogroms and the Holocaust.
It makes me so upset.
I was startled that this guy is advising the president and without an ounce of compassion for Palestinians.
I was urging that there be compassion for both people who have suffering and fears.
American policy needs to understand both, not prioritize one human life over another.
Democrats are the ones who wrote in theirplatformabout the equal worth of Palestinian and Israeli lives.
I didnt write it.
I dont know what to think, or how to operate in this realm.
Oct. 7 was a horrific tragedy and an act of terror that is inexcusable, and Hamas committed crimes.
And no one in this crowd is willing or able they dont have the perspective to do that.
This crowd being the Democratic White House, to be clear?
They could have easily put her on stage at the convention.
They didnt even see it as something worth considering.
I just dont get it.
Its insulting, obviously, and demeaning to my community.
And so thats very hurtful.
Its not a smart strategy.
I dont think its smart politics.
